Well it depends on what you are doing, perhaps you can give us some examples of what you are haveing problems with and we can give you some pointers.
Some very basic stuff though. Always advance as early as possable with dutch, you can do it as fast or a hair faster than ottos in most cases depends on maps and where the gold is. I'll say this Dutch get a raw deal from the map generator. Sometimes the starting shipment pops out on one side of TC while the mine is a ways on the other side and food is in yet a complete other direction, and usually far away, you waste alot of time walking back and forth trying to get everything and that can be end game against a good rusher.
In the low level Hc's I found the Dutch Rush to be very effective and powerfull also map control is very important for dutch not so mutch for all the other civs. But you need to keep that gold flowing, And banks while I use them more and alot earlier in the higher levels. There quite expensive early on so you are better off being on the offensive and keeping your side of the safe as long as you can.
Against French, Germs always grab the 8 pike card they almost always come at you with cav. I always leave a few at my base to deal with raids.
Against Otto built your barracks offsite where they don't expect you to build, they can take it down really fast and half the time Jans show up before your first skirms are out, the 3 Hussar card for raiding and a stable fairly quickly after. You are gonna need hussars to handle Abus Guns, not the most effective way and the wood is really hard to come by but it at least gives you a fighting chance.
Definately learn to micro your skirms I Rarely build more than 10 In age II if i can avoid it. When you have alot of skirm set them up in diffrent grops of 5-6. It takes about that many to focus fire and kill one Infantry in one shot, kill retreat, etc, that way you can kill more than one at a time. Skirms can be the worst units in the game or the best, it all depends on your micro, you make the difrence. Also use your explorer as a meatshield he's wonderfull at at drawing fire and giving you an edge.
Go to Age III as fast as you can and reserve as much gold as you can by maximizing your skirms. I go to Age III primarily for one reason. Swiss Pike Merc card, Its 1200 gold but if you micro your skirms well enough you should have plenty or you can use the 700 gold shipment. A swiss pike/Skirm army is a thing of beuty, They can counter just about everything and is better at taking down buildings than a few falconets wich are more expensive. You can steam roll someones base with these very quickly. By age III you should have a couple banks I tend to rely On Mercs at this point since they tend to be cheaper then artillary and are harder to counter.
Anyway things will get tougher at higher levels the french get Age II skirms, the spanish will fast fort 7-8 Min and hit you with veteran skirms in age III you can't even upgrade yours till age IV. The other civs get an assortment of diffrent cards that pretty much wipe out Dutch Advantages. The one exception is the bank and if dutch had an easier time gather wood. They would probably an awsome turtle civ but wood is the one resource i have been unable to get a good constant supply of It might be my play style, not sure.
There are plenty of players here who have an affection for the dutch. We all seem to use the dutch in diffrent ways. So Im sure they will kick in some strats Ideas. Theres no really super effective strat with them unlike other civs you just have to play better. Wich is probly why some of us have an affection for them.
P.S. Ruyters are an absolute necessity when facing French and Germ, but less uselfull against other civs do to there short range and they tend to be slugglish in the micro department unlike skirms. They also not very good anti arty. So keep them around for anti cav but if you see alot of pike habs mixed in you might want keep them off to the side. All in all I rather have Huss, Habs and upgraded pikes to deal with Arty. But usually have swiss pike way before I see a Falco and rely on that.
[This message has been edited by Drench19 (edited 11-27-2005 @ 02:27 PM).]